MY FORECASTS OF 1906 AND 1912[4]
[4] This chapter is entirely made up of extracts taken from
my pamphlet, "The Baghdad Railway," _published in_ 1906, and
from my book, "The Anglo-German Problem," published in 1912.
I.--WE ARE DRIFTING INTO WAR.
"Europe is drifting slowly but steadily towards an awful catastrophe,
which, if it does happen, will throw back civilization for the coming
generation, as the war of 1870 threw back civilization for the
generation which followed and which inherited its dire legacy of evil.
For the last ten years two great Western Powers and two kindred races
have become increasingly estranged, and have been engaging in military
preparations which are taxing to the utmost the resources of the
people, and are paralyzing social and political reform in both
countries. A combination of many causes, moral and political, has bred
suspicion and distrust, and the fallacious assumption of conflicting
interests has turned suspicion into hatred. Only a year ago England
and Germany stood on the brink of war. If, after the _coup_ of Agadir,
Germany had persisted in her policy, the conflagration would have
ensued, the storm would have burst out. The war-cloud has temporarily
lifted, but it has not passed away. The danger is as acute as it
was, because the causes which produced the recent outburst are still
with us, and the malignant passions are gathering strength with each
passing day.
This formidable evil is threatening England, but it does not originate
in England, and England cannot be held responsible for it. The period
of aggressive Imperialism has passed away. Mr. Joseph Chamberlain and
Mr. Rudyard Kipling, in so far as they once represented the old
bellicose Imperialism, to-day are exploded forces. The English people
were never more peacefully inclined, and Liberals and Tories are
united in their desire for a pacific solution of the present
difficulties.
It is Germany and not England which is the storm-centre, the volcanic
zone, in international politics. From there have come, ever since
1860, the tension and friction, the suspicion and distrust. It is
there that the pagan gods of the Nibelungen are forging their deadly
weapons."
II.--THE STRENGTH OF ANTI-BRITISH FEELING IN GERMANY.
"German and English publicists, whilst admitting the existence of a
feeling of hostility, point out the many unmistakable signs of
goodwill heralding a better understanding in the future. They point to
the frequent exchange of international courtesies, to the periodical
visits of Members of Parliament and of representative men of the
Churches; they point to the visit of Viscount Haldane; and last, but
not least, they point to the many pacific assurances of the German
Kaiser. With regard to the utterances of the Kaiser, I can only say
that if the Kaiser has made many pacific speeches, his aggressive
speeches have been even more numerous. I have no doubt that the Kaiser
is perfectly sincere, and I believe him to be animated with the most
cordial feelings for this country. If I am asked to explain the
contradiction, I can only see one explanation, and it is not one which
I am very willing to admit. And the explanation is this: when he is
expressing words of peace and goodwill he is speaking in his own
private capacity and as the grandson of an English queen. On the
contrary, whenever he utters words of ill-will and menace, whenever he
waves the flag, when he shows the mailed fist, he is acting as the
representative and speaking as the spokesman of a considerable
fraction amongst his subjects.
That there has existed in Germany a very widespread feeling of
hostility against the English people we have uncontrovertible proof.
And the evidence we have on no less an authority than the Kaiser
himself. In the famous interview published by the _Daily Telegraph_,
William II. emphatically testified to the existence and to the
persistence of the feeling which he had systematically attempted to
counteract. The admission raised legitimate indignation in Germany. It
was ill-advised. It was calculated to intensify the very animosity
which it deprecated. But the fact itself, the existence of the
animosity, could not be disputed. After all, the Kaiser ought to know
the feelings, if not of the majority of his subjects, at least of
those ruling classes with whom he comes in contact."
III.--WAR THE GERMAN IDEAL AND THE GERMAN IDOL.
"Contemporary German philosophy is a 'war philosophy.' In France we
may find isolated thinkers, like Joseph de Maistre, who are the
apostles of war, who maintain that war is a Divine and providential
institution, one of the eternal verities. In Germany the paradoxes of
de Maistre are the commonplaces of historians and moralists. To an
Englishman war is a dwindling force, an anachronism. It may still
sometimes be a necessity, a _dura lex_, an _ultima ratio_, but it is
always a monstrous calamity. In other words, to an Englishman war is
evil, war is _immoral_. On the contrary, to the German war is
essentially moral. Indeed, it is the source of the highest morality,
of the most valuable virtues, and without war the human race would
speedily degenerate. It is the mainspring of national progress. There
are three causes which have ensured the present greatness of the
German Empire: moral virtue in the individual, political unity, and
economic prosperity. If we were to believe modern theorists, Germany
owes all three to the beneficent action of war. Germany is not
indebted for its culture to the genius of its writers or artists, but
to the iron and blood of its statesmen and warriors. It is the
glorious triumvirate of Bismarck, Moltke, and von Roon who have been
the master-builders of the Vaterland.
Our main contention is, that as the pacific philosophy of Herder and
Kant, of Goethe and Lessing, provides the key to the old Germany
described in Madame de Staël's masterpiece, even so the military
philosophy of Mommsen and Treitschke, of Bismarck and Nietzsche, gives
us the key of modern Prussianized Germany. The whole German people
have become Bismarckian, and believe that it is might which creates
right. The whole of the younger generation have become Nietzschean in
politics, and believe in the will to power--_der Wille zur Macht_.
That political philosophy is to-day the living and inspiring ideal
which informs German policy. And it is that philosophy which we have
to keep constantly in mind if we wish to understand the currents and
under-currents of contemporary politics and make a correct forecast of
the future; if we wish to distinguish between what is real and unreal
in international relations, between the professions of politicians and
the aims and aspirations of the people. German statesmen may protest
about their love of peace, but the service they render to peace is
only lip service. Peace is only a means, war is the goal. We are
reminded of Professor Delbrück's assertion that, considering the
infinitely complex conditions of modern warfare, many years of peace
are necessary to and must be utilized for the preparation of the wars
which are to come.
How, then, can we be reassured by any German pacifist protests and
demonstrations? How can we believe that German peace is anything more
than a precarious truce as long as German statesmen, German thinkers,
German teachers and preachers, unanimously tell us that the philosophy
of war is the only gospel of salvation? How can a patriotic German, if
he is consistent, abstain eventually from waging war when he is
firmly convinced that his country owes her political unity, her moral
temper, and her Imperial prosperity, whatever she is and whatever she
has, mainly to the agency of war? When war has done so much for
Germany in the past, will it not do greater things for Germany in the
future?
War may be a curse or it may be a blessing. If war is a curse, then
the wells of public opinion have been poisoned in Germany, perhaps for
generations to come. If war is a blessing, if the philosophy of war is
indeed the gospel of the super-man, sooner or later the German people
are bound to put that gospel into practice. They must look forward
with anxious and eager desire to the glorious day when once more they
are able to fight the heroic battles of Teutonism, when they are able
to fulfil the providential destinies of the German super-race, the
chosen champions of civilization."
IV.--WHY GERMANY HAS KEPT THE PEACE.
"Uninfluenced by those ominous signs of the times, English and German
optimists still refuse to surrender, still persist in their optimism.
They argue that the situation is no doubt serious, but that those
outbursts of popular feeling in Germany, violent as they are, have
largely been caused by English suspicion and distrust, and that there
has been nothing in the German policy to justify that English
suspicion and distrust. After all, deeds are more important than
words, and by her deeds Germany has proved for forty-two years that
she is persistently pacific. Since 1870 Russia has made war against
Turkey and against Japan. England has made war against the Transvaal.
Italy has waged war against Turkey. France after Fashoda would have
declared war against England, and after Tangier would have declared
war against Germany, if France had been prepared. Of all the Great
Powers, Germany alone for nearly half a century has been determined to
keep the peace of the world.
The reply to this objection is very simple. I am not examining here
whether a state of affairs which has transformed Europe into an armed
camp of six million soldiers, and which absorbs for military
expenditure two-thirds of the revenue of European States, can be
appropriately called a state of peace. It is certainly not a _pax
romana_. It is most certainly not a _pax britannica_. It may be a _pax
teutonica_ or, rather, a _pax borussica_, but such as it is, ruinous
and demoralizing, it is also lamentably precarious and perilously
unstable. And if Germany has kept this _pax borussica_ for forty-two
years, it has not been the fault of the German Government. Rather has
it been kept because she has been prevented from declaring war by
outside interference; or because she has been able to carry out her
policy and to achieve her ambitions without going the length of
declaring war; or because a war would have been not only a heinous
crime, but a political blunder.
But the real reason why Germany for forty years has kept the peace is
because a war would have been both fatal and futile, injurious and
superfluous. It would have been injurious, for it would have arrested
the growing trade and the expanding industries of the empire. And,
above all, it would have been superfluous, for in time of peace
Germany reaped all the advantages which a successful war would have
given her. For twenty-five years the German Empire wielded an
unchallenged supremacy on the Continent of Europe. For twenty years
she directed the course of international events.
But since the opening of the twentieth century Germany has ceased to
be paramount; she has ceased to control European policy at her own
sweet will, and weaker States have ceased to be given over to her
tender mercies. To the Triple Alliance has been opposed the Triple
Entente. The balance of power has been re-established. The three
'hereditary enemies'--England, France, and Russia--have joined hands,
and have delivered Europe from the incubus of German suzerainty.
German diplomacy has strained every effort to break the Triple
Entente, in turn wooing and threatening France and Russia, keeping
open the Moroccan sore as the Neapolitan _lazzarone_ keeps open the
wound which ensures his living, and finally challenging the naval
supremacy of England, and preparing to become as powerful at sea as
she is on the Continent."
V.--THE POLITICAL PREPARATION OF WAR.
"Precisely because the final issue will largely depend on the
personality of the soldier, the moral and civic preparation must be at
least as important as the technical, and here the Government has an
important part to play through the school and through the Press. _Both
the school and the Press must both persistently emphasize the meaning
and the necessity of war as an indispensable means of policy and of
culture_, and must inculcate the duty of personal sacrifice. To
achieve that end the Government must have its own popular papers,
whose aim it will be to stimulate patriotism, to preach loyalty to the
Kaiser, to resist the disintegrating influence of Social Democracy.
But not least important is the political preparation for the war.
Statesmanship and diplomacy confine themselves too much to
consolidating alliances and entering into new understandings. Nothing
could be more dangerous than to rely too much on treaties and
alliances. Alliances are not final. _Agreements are only conditional._
They are only binding, _rebus sic stantibus_, as long as conditions
remain the same--_as long as it is in the interest of the allies to
keep them_; for nothing can compel a State to act against its own
interest, and there is no alliance or bond in the world which can
subsist if it is not based on the mutual advantage of both parties. It
is therefore essential that the war shall be fought under such
conditions that it shall be in the interest of every ally to be loyal
to his engagements; and therefore it is essential for the State so to
direct and combine political events as to produce a conjuncture of
interests and to provoke the war at the most favourable moment."
VI.--THE IMAGINARY GERMAN GRIEVANCES.
"England cannot honestly admit the truth and reality of German
grievances. England cannot admit that in the past she has ever adopted
an attitude of contemptuous superiority towards the German people.
Still less can England admit that she has systematically stood in the
way of German colonial ambitions. _She cannot admit it, for the simple
reason that only a few years ago those German colonial ambitions did
not exist._ Almost to the end of his long rule, Bismarck would not
have colonies, and he deliberately encouraged France in that policy of
African expansion which Germany now objects to. Germany would probably
have had a much larger colonial empire if she had chosen to have it.
History teaches us that in the development of European colonization
there are some nations, like the Spaniards and Portuguese, that have
come too early in the field. There are other nations, like England and
Russia, that have come in the nick of time. And, finally, there are
nations that have come too late. The German people have arrived too
late in the race for colonial empire. They may regret it, but surely
it would be monstrous to use the fact as a grievance against the
people of this country. I may bitterly regret that twenty years ago I
had not the money or the energy or the foresight to invest in the
development of Argentine, or that I did not buy an estate in Canada,
which in those early days I might have got for a hundred pounds, and
which to-day would be worth hundreds of thousands. But that is no
reason why I should hate the present possessors of landed property in
the Far West or in the Far South. That is no reason why I should wish
to dispossess them of land which they have legitimately acquired,
whether they owe it to their luck or to their pluck, to favourable
circumstances or to their initiative and perseverance."
VII.--THE PACIFIC MEANING OF THE ENTENTE.
"The new grouping of Powers, which has reduced Germany from a position
of sole supremacy to a position of equality, is not the result of any
artificial combinations of diplomacy. Still less is it the result of a
conspiracy, inspired by English envy and English hatred. It was not
initiated by Edward VII. It has survived his death. To assume that
England would have been capable of isolating Germany by her own single
efforts, and in order to serve her own selfish purposes, is to
attribute to England a power which she does not wield. If there has
been a conspiracy, France, Italy, Russia, and the United States,
inhabited by twenty million citizens who are German by birth or by
descent, have all been willing accomplices. The Triple Entente has
been a spontaneous revolt of Europe against German aggressiveness and
German militarism.
England has not attempted to isolate Germany. She has only herself
emerged from her isolation. If she can be accused of having made a
grievous mistake in her foreign policy, it is that of having been
blind for so long to the perils which threatened European liberty.
Since 1870 she has submitted for twenty-five years to German
predominance, because she had to oppose the colonial ambitions of
France in Africa and the ambitions of Russia in Asia. To-day England
has returned to her ancient traditions. She has never suffered for any
length of time, and will never suffer as long as she remains a
first-class Power, from the exclusive predominance of any one
Continental nation. She has ever fought for the maintenance of the
balance of power. She defended that balance against Charles V. and
Philip II. in the sixteenth century, against Louis XIV. in the
seventeenth, against Napoleon, against Nicholas I., and Alexander II.
in the nineteenth century. She defends it to-day against William II.
But she is no more the enemy of Germany to-day than she was the enemy
of France or Russia ten years ago. _And if the equilibrium of Europe
were threatened to-morrow by Russia, as it is threatened to-day by
Germany, England would become to-morrow the ally of Germany._
It may be contended, no doubt, that in opposing the supremacy of
another empire on land, she is only defending her own supremacy on the
sea. But the history of four hundred years convincingly shows that
England in defending her own interests has always been fighting the
battles of European liberty. And to-day more than ever, when Europe is
transformed into an armed camp, when might has become the criterion of
right, when all nations are living in perpetual dread of a European
conflagration, the strict adherence of England to her old principle of
the balance of power remains the best sanction of international law
and the surest guarantee of the peace of the world."
VIII.--GERMAN MEGALOMANIA.
"Whatever may be the cause of the state of mind of the Germans, they
are certainly suffering just now from acute 'megalomania.' The
abnormal self-conceit, the inflated national consciousness, express
themselves in a thousand ways, some of which are naïve and harmless,
whilst others are grossly offensive. They show themselves in a craving
for titles and in gaudy and tasteless public buildings;[5] in the
thousand and one statues of Bismarck and William I.; they reveal
themselves in the articles of journalists and in the writings of
historians; but above all, the German megalomania finds expression in
the seven thousand speeches and in the three hundred uniforms of the
Kaiser. In examining the influence of William II. we shall come to the
conclusion that it is his defects far more than his virtues that have
made him the representative hero of the German people. His winged
words voice the aspirations of his subjects. Like the Kaiser, every
German believes that he is 'the salt of the earth'--_Wir sind das Salz
der Erde_. Like Nietzsche, the modern German believes that the world
must be ruled by a super-man, and that he is the super-man. Like
Houston Stewart Chamberlain, the German is convinced that he belongs
to a super-race, and that the Teuton has been the master-builder of
European civilization."
[5] See an amusing article, "Ornamente," in the _Zukunft_.
IX.--GERMAN SELF-ASSERTION.
"The self-assertion of the Germans and the contempt for the foreigner
reveal themselves in their political dealings with other nations.
German statesmen continue the methods of Bismarck without having his
genius. German politicians delight in shaking the mailed fist, in
waving the national banner with the Imperial black eagle, the ominous
and symbolical bird of prey. Wherever they meet with opposition they
at once resort to comminatory messages. Compare the methods of the
Emperor William with those of Edward VII. Nothing illustrates better
the differences between the characteristics of English and German
diplomacy than the dramatic contrast between the bragging, indiscreet,
impulsive, explosive manner of the Kaiser and the quiet, courteous
manner of the English monarch. Nothing explains better the striking
success which has attended English policy and the no less striking
failure which has attended German policy. For in international as well
as in private relations, intellectual superiority is often as
efficient a weapon as an appeal to brute force. And all the might of
the German Empire has not saved the German foreign policy from
persistent bankruptcy. That bankruptcy is unanimously admitted even in
Germany, and partly accounts for the present temper of the nation. The
times have changed, and even the weak cannot now be bullied into
submission. At the Algeciras Conference even those small nations whose
most obvious interest it was to side with Germany gave their moral
support to France."
X.--GERMANY STANDS FOR REACTION.
"There still remains for us to examine one deeper reason why Germany
is distrusted and disliked in Europe. _She is mainly distrusted
because she continues to be the reactionary force in international
politics._ Outside the sphere of German influence the democratic ideal
has triumphed all over the civilized world, after centuries of heroic
struggle and tragic catastrophes. But in Germany the old dogma is
still supreme. Wherever German power has made itself felt for the last
forty years--in Italy and Austria, in Russia and Turkey--it has
countenanced reaction and tyranny. In politics Germany is to-day what
Austria and Russia were in the days of the Holy Alliance, the power of
darkness. Whilst in the provinces of science and art the German people
are generally progressive, in politics the German Government is
consistently retrogressive. It cannot be sufficiently emphasized and
repeated that, more than any other State--more even than
Russia--Prussia stands in the way of political advance. It was Prussia
that helped to crush the Polish struggle for freedom in 1863; when, a
few years ago, English public opinion was protesting against the
Armenian massacres, the Kaiser stood loyally by Abdul Hamid and
propped his tottering throne; when the Russian Liberals were engaged
in a life-and-death struggle with Czardom, the Kaiser gave his moral
support to Russian despotism. It is not too much to say that it is the
evil influence of Prusso-Germany alone which keeps despotism alive in
the modern world."
XI.--PRUSSIA CONTROLS GERMANY.
"It is difficult to exaggerate the political domination of Germany by
Prussia. The practice belies the theory: it is not as German Emperor
but as Prussian King that William II. rules the confederation. The
larger is merged in the smaller. The poor barren plains of Brandenburg
and Pomerania rule over the smiling vineyards and romantic mountains
of the south and west. The German people are governed more completely
from Berlin and Potsdam than the French were ever governed from Paris
and Versailles. And they are governed with an iron hand. In theory,
every part of the empire may have a proportional share in the
administration of the country; in reality, Prussia has the ultimate
political and financial control. Germany pays the taxes; Prussia
spends them. Germany provides the soldiers; Prussia commands them. And
the Prussian War Lord and his Junkers in the last resort decide the
issues of peace and war.
To realize how complete is the Prussian control we need only consider
the fact that in the supreme Federal Parliament--the Bundesrat--for
forty-two years the Prussian representatives have always had it their
own way. Yet Prussia, according to the Constitution, has only got
seventeen delegates out of fifty-two. When the Imperial Constitution
was framed it was thought that the Prussian representation was far too
small, and the fear was repeatedly expressed that the Prussian vote in
the Bundesrat would be overruled. But not once has it happened that
the German majority in the Bundesrat has dared to oppose any important
measure initiated by the Prussian Government. For all practical
purposes, therefore, Prussia is the suzerain power. The German
principalities and kingdoms are reduced to political tutelage and
subjection."
XII.--WHY PRUSSIA HAS ENSLAVED GERMANY.
"How shall we explain this startling paradox? How is it, and why is
it, that the artistic and exuberant, genial and sentimental German
submits to the hard rule of the commonplace, uninteresting, and dour
Prussian?
If you ask ninety-nine out of a hundred Germans they will not give you
a reply. They know too little of and care too little about politics to
be even aware of the fact. They are satisfied with appearances. They
do not see the King of Prussia behind the German Kaiser. They are
hypnotized by the glittering helmet of the War Lord.
But if you succeed in discovering one in a hundred who understands the
relation between Germany and Prussia, and who has thought out the
political problem, he will probably give you something like the
following reply:
'I know that there is no love lost between the Germans and the
Prussians. I know that in culture and native ability we are as
superior to the Prussians as our vine-clad hills are superior in
beauty to the sandy wastes of Pomerania. And I know that in politics
we play a subordinate part, although we are superior. But I also
realize that it is necessary for us to submit. And it is necessary for
us to submit, precisely because of our virtues. For those virtues of
ours are unpractical. And it is necessary for the Prussians to rule,
precisely because of their shortcomings. For those shortcomings are
practical. The pure gold of the German temper could never be made
into hard coin nor used to advantage. It could be made to produce
splendid works of art, gems and diadems and ornaments, but for
practical purposes, in order to forge the weapons of the Nibelungen,
the alloy of the baser metal was indispensable. It required the
mixture of Prussian sand and Prussian iron to weld us into a nation,
to raise us to an empire. It is because we Germans are artists and
dreamers and individualists that we could never manage our own
affairs, that we have always been "non-political animals."[6] On the
contrary, it is because the Prussian has no brilliance, no romance, no
personality, that he makes a splendid soldier and a model bureaucrat.
Two things above all were required to make Germany into a powerful
State--a strong army and a well-ordered administration. Prussia has
given us both.
[6] This is again and again admitted even by the most
patriotic German writers. (See General von Bernhardi's last
book, "The Coming War": "Wir sind ein unpolitisches
Volk"--"We are a non-political people.")
'And let us not forget that Germany more than any other Power required
such a strong army and such a strong administration, not only owing to
the shortcomings of her national character, but owing to the weakness
and danger of her geographical position. Germany is open on every
frontier. She has ever been harassed by dangerous enemies. Only a
generation ago she was threatened on every side. On the north she had
to face the rulers of the sea, who hampered her commercial expansion;
on the west she had to face the restless Gaul; on the south she was
confronted with the clerical and Jesuitical empire of the Habsburg; on
the east with the empire of the Romanovs. From all those enemies
Prussia has ultimately saved us. The Hohenzollern dynasty has proved a
match for them all.
'The whole annals of Germany and Prussia are a striking proof of the
political weakness of the German and of the strength of the Prussian
character. Again and again Germany has witnessed magnificent outbursts
of national prosperity. She has seen the might of the Hohenstaufen;
she has seen the wealth of the Hansa towns. Again and again she has
witnessed the spontaneous generation and blossoming of civic
prosperity; she has seen the glory and pride of Nuremberg and
Heidelberg, of Cologne and Frankfurt, the art of Dürer and Holbein.
But again and again German culture has been nipped in the bud. It has
been destroyed by civil war and religious war, by internal anarchy and
foreign invasion. The Thirty Years' War devastated every province of
the German Empire, and such was the misery and anarchy that in many
parts the people had reverted to savagery and cannibalism.[7] And
hardly had the country recovered from the horrors of the wars of
religion, when repeated French invasions laid waste the rich provinces
of the Rhine and Palatinate. So completely did German rulers of the
eighteenth century betray their duty to the people that some Princes
degraded themselves to the point of selling their soldiers to the
Hanoverian Kings in order to fight the battles of England in America.
[7] See Arvède Barine's "Madame: Mère du Régent."
'Whilst the German Princes were thus squandering the treasure and
life-blood of their subjects, there was growing up in the North a
little State which was destined from the most unpromising beginnings
for the most glorious future. It is true that the little Prussian
State was wretchedly poor; for that very reason the Prussian rulers
had to practise strict economy and unrelenting industry. It is true
the country was always insecure and constantly threatened by powerful
neighbours; for that very reason the people had to submit to a rigid
discipline and a strong military organization. It is true the country
was depopulated; for that very reason the rulers had to attract
foreign settlers by a just, wise, and tolerant government.'
A patriotic German might illustrate in the following simple parable
the complex and strange relations between Germany and Prussia:
'The German people a century ago might be compared to the heirs and
owners of an ancient estate. The estate was rich and of romantic
beauty. The heirs were clever, adventurous, and universally popular.
But although devoted to each other, they could not get on together.
Their personality was too strong, and they were always quarrelling.
Nor could they turn to advantage their vast resources, and the natural
wealth of the estate only served to attract outside marauders. They
were so extravagant and so unpractical that they would lay out
beautiful parks and build magnificent mansions whilst neglecting to
drain the land and to repair the fences. They would spend lavishly on
luxuries, but they would grudge food to the cattle and manure to the
fields. Thus, with all their splendid possessions, the German heirs
were always on the verge of bankruptcy.
'To extricate themselves, they decided to accept the services of a
factor and manager. The factor was the Prussian Junker. He was an
alien. For he could hardly be called a German. In blood he was more
Slav than Teutonic. He was unrefined, unsympathetic, and overbearing.
But as a manager he was splendid. He bought up outlying parts to round
off the estate. He paid more attention to the necessaries than to the
luxuries and the amenities of life. He was more careful to surround
himself with a strong police force than with poets and minstrels. But
he was able to keep out the marauders and the poachers. He was able to
protect the property against stronger neighbours and to bully the
weaker neighbours into surrendering desirable additions to the estate.
In a short time the heirs, formerly universally popular, were
cordially hated in the land. But their rents had increased by leaps
and bounds, and the German estate had been rounded off and made into
one solid and compact whole.'
Such, German writers would tell us, is the parable of Germany and
Prussia. The Germans are the gifted, generous, and spendthrift heirs
to an illustrious domain. Prussia is the alien, upstart, unpopular,
unsympathetic, bullying factor and manager. But to this bullying
factor Germany owes the consolidation and prosperity of the national
estate."
XIII.--THE GERMAN REICHSTAG AS A DEBATING CLUB.
"We are apt to forget that, strictly speaking, a Parliamentary
government does not exist in Germany, although we constantly speak of
a 'German Parliament.' According to the Constitution, the Chancellor
is not responsible to Parliament, he is only responsible to the
Emperor. There is no Cabinet or delegation of the majority of the
Reichstag. There is no party system. There are only party squabbles. I
do not know whether Mr. Belloc would approve of the German
Constitution, but it certainly enables the Government to soar high
above all the parties in the Reichstag. German Liberals may be morally
justified in their struggle against political reaction, but
technically the Government are acting within their constitutional
right. And when, therefore, the Reichstag attempts to control the
executive, it is rather the Reichstag which is unconstitutional. On
the other hand, when the Emperor asserts his Divine right, it is he
who is true to the spirit of the Constitution; he is only giving a
religious interpretation and colour to a political prerogative which
he undoubtedly possesses. And not only is there no Parliamentary
government, but there is not even a desire, except with a small
fraction of Radicals, to possess such a government. Prussian
publicists again and again tell us that Germany does not want to copy
English institutions. The old German monarchic institutions are good
enough for Germany. Read the treatise of Treitschke, the great
historian and political philosopher of modern Prussia. He
systematically attempts to belittle every achievement of the
Parliamentary system; and every prominent writer follows in his
footsteps. Prussia has not produced a Guizot, a Tocqueville, a Stuart
Mill, or a Bryce. Her thinkers are all imbued with the traditions of
enlightened despotism. Even the great Mommsen cannot be adduced as an
exception. He makes us forget his Liberalism, and only remember his
Cæsarism.
The powers of the Reichstag are very limited. It is mainly a machine
for voting supplies, but even that financial control is more nominal
than real. For under the Constitution the Assembly must needs make
provision for the army and navy, which are outside and above party
politics. And having previously fixed the contingent of the Imperial
forces, the army and navy estimates must needs follow. In the present
tension of international politics, a reduction is out of the question.
Theoretically, the Reichstag can indeed oppose an increase, but
practically the increase is almost automatic. The Reichstag could only
postpone it, and in so doing would have to face unpopularity. Every
party vies with its rivals in sacrificing their principles on the
altar of patriotism. Whereas the Catholic party in Belgium has for
twenty-eight years refused the means of national defence, and has made
the Belgian Army into a byword on the plea that barrack life is
dangerous to the religious faith of the peasant, the German Catholics
have voted with exemplary docility every increase of the army and
navy. Only once did they dare to propose a small reduction in the
estimates for the expenditure on the war against the Herreros. But the
indignation they raised by their independent attitude, and the
doubtful elections of 1907, taught them a practical lesson in
patriotic submission which they are not likely soon to forget.
The Reichstag, therefore, is largely a debating club, and its debates
are as irresponsible as those of students in a University union,
because no speech, however eloquent, carries with it any of the
responsibilities of government. The Opposition in England is careful
of the language it uses, and more careful of the promises it makes,
because it knows that it may be called upon to fulfil its promises and
to carry out the policy it advocates. In Germany there is no such
possibility. The Opposition is only platonic. It is doomed to
impotence."
XIV.--THE SERVILITY OF THE GERMAN UNIVERSITIES AND OF THE CHURCHES.
"It has often happened in other countries when the expression of free
opinions has become dangerous or difficult that independent political
thought has taken refuge in the Universities. Even in Russia the
Universities have been a stronghold of Liberalism. In the Germany of
the first half of the nineteenth century many a University professor
suffered in the cause of political liberty. In the Germany of to-day
the Universities are becoming the main support of reaction.
Professors, although they are nominated by the faculties, are
appointed by the Government; and here again the Government only
appoints 'safe' men. A scholar who has incurred the displeasure of the
political authorities must be content to remain a _Privatdozent_ all
his life. _The much-vaunted independence of the German professors is a
thing of the past._ They may be independent scientifically; they are
not independent politically. It is not that scholars have not the
abstract right to speak out, or that they would be dismissed once they
have been appointed; rather is it that they would not be appointed or
promoted. A young scholar with Radical leanings knows that he will not
be called to Berlin.
The German Universities still lead political thought; they still wield
political influence, and their influence may be even greater to-day
than it ever was, but that influence is enlisted almost exclusively on
the side of reaction.
And what is true of the Universities is true of the Churches. Of the
Roman Catholic Church it is hardly necessary to speak. _Non ragionar
di lor, ma guarda e passa._ The history of German Catholicism proves
once more that the Church is never more admirable than when she is
persecuted. During the Kulturkampf the Catholics stood for political
liberty, whereas the so-called National Liberals stood for State
centralization and political despotism. To-day, from being persecuted,
the Catholic Church has become a persecuting Church. She has entered
into an unholy compact with the Prussian Government. She has ceased to
be religious, and has become clerical. She has ceased to be universal.
She has become narrowly Nationalist. She might have played a glorious
part in the new empire. Instead she has resisted every attempt at
financial reform. She might have resisted the oppressive policy
against the Poles. Instead she has connived at oppression. She might
have opposed the orgies of militarism. Instead she has voted every
increase in the army and navy. She has bartered her dignity and
spiritual independence to secure confessional privileges, and to get
her share in the spoils of office.
The Protestant Churches have not had the same power for evil, yet
they have fallen even lower than the Catholic Church. They have lost
even more completely every vestige of independence. German University
theologians may be advanced in higher criticism, but they are
opportunists in practical politics. They are very daring when they
examine the Divine right of Christ, but they are very timid when they
examine the Divine right of the King and Emperor. Protestantism
produced one or two prominent progressive leaders; but they have had
to leave their Churches. Dr. Naumann has become a layman; Stöcker,
when he espoused the cause of the people, was excommunicated, and the
Kaiser hurled one of his most violent speeches against his once
favourite Court chaplain."
XV.--THE PAN-GERMAN PLOT.[8]
[8] This was written and published in 1906.
"For forty years Germany had been seeking an outlet for her teeming
population and her expanding industries. Hitherto emigration had
seemed to be a sufficient outlet and a sufficient source of strength.
But as Germany was becoming more and more the controlling power of the
Continent, she refused to be contented with sending out millions of
her sons, who, as mere emigrants to foreign countries, were lost to
the Vaterland.[9] How different would the power of Germany have been,
German Imperialists were ever repeating, if the 20,000,000 Teutons who
have colonized the United States, or Brazil, or Argentina, and have
been absorbed and Americanized and Saxonized, had settled in
territories under the Imperial flag!
[9] To-day the immigration into Germany exceeds the
emigration.
And thus Pan-Germanists have been looking towards every part of the
horizon. They have first looked to the north and the north-west, and
they have reflected that the Rhine ought to belong to the Vaterland;
that Amsterdam, Rotterdam, and Antwerp are the natural German
harbours; that Denmark, Holland, and Flemish Belgium are the outposts
of Germany for the transit commerce of Europe; and that all these
outposts ought to be included either in an economic Zollverein or in a
political confederation.[10]
[10] In Justus Perthes's widely scattered "Alldeutscher
Atlas," edited by Paul Langhans, and published by the
Alldeutscher Verband, both Holland and Flemish Belgium are
considered and "coloured" as an integral part of the future
German Empire.
But Germany wisely realized that those northern ambitions would meet
with absolute resistance on the part of other Powers, that she was not
yet strong enough to defy that resistance, and that this fulfilment of
her aspirations must be postponed until she was prepared to fight for
the mastery of the sea. In the meantime, she contented herself with
_peacefully_ annexing the commerce of the Flemish and Dutch ports,
with building up a mercantile and a war navy, with advocating the
historical maritime philosophy of Captain Mahan, and with repeating on
every occasion the famous note of warning: '_Unsere Zukunft ist auf
dem Wasser._' Biding her time, and following the line of least
resistance, Germany for the last twenty years therefore extended
steadily towards the south and towards the east. Towards the south
she saw two decaying empires, Austria-Hungary and Turkey, which seemed
to be a natural prey for her political and commercial ambitions: two
conglomerates of hostile races which are waiting for a master. Towards
the east she saw one of the most ancient seats of human civilization,
a huge and rich territory, which is the one great country, in close
proximity to Europe, which is still left unoccupied and undeveloped.
On those three empires Germany set her heart, and with the method and
determination which always characterize her she set to work. And with
an equally characteristic spirit this gigantic scheme of commercial
and political absorption of three empires, from the Upper Danube to
the Persian Gulf, was being explained away and justified by an all
comprehensive watchword: the _Drang nach Osten_. It was only in
response to this irresistible call and impulse, this _Drang_ and
pressure, it was only to obey an historical mission, that the Teuton
was going to regenerate the crumbling empires of Austria, of Turkey,
and of Asia Minor.
In the first place, let us consider for one moment the
Austrian-Hungarian Empire. It is now fifty years since, through the
Battle of Sadowa, Austria-Hungary was ousted from the German
Confederation. The same reasons which impelled Protestant Prussia to
drive Catholic Austria from the Germanic Confederation are still in
large measure subsisting to-day, and I do not think that the
Hohenzollern has any intention of forcing the Habsburg into the
Confederation again, merely to obey the behests of the Pan-Germanists.
Prussia has no interest whatever in reopening the ancient dualism of
North and South, in re-establishing the two poles and antipodes,
Berlin and Vienna. _As a matter of fact, ever since 1870
Austria-Hungary has been far more useful to German aims in her present
dependent condition than if she were an integral part of the
Confederation._ In Continental politics as well as in colonial
politics, a disguised protectorate may be infinitely preferable to
virtual annexation. The protectorate of Tunis has given far less
trouble to France than the colony of Algeria. And for all practical
interests and purposes, Austria-Hungary has become a German
dependency. She has been drawn into the orbit of the Triple Alliance.
She follows the political fortunes of the predominant partner. She
almost forms part of the German Zollverein, in that her tariffs are
systematically favourable to her northern neighbour. _But above all,
Austria-Hungary renders to Germany the inestimable service both of
'civilizing'--that is, of 'Germanizing'--the inferior races, the
Slavs, and of keeping them in check. It is a very disagreeable and
difficult task, which Germany infinitely prefers to leave to Austria
rather than to assume herself._ And it is a task for which, as
Professor Lamprecht, the national historian, is compelled to admit,
the Austrian German seems far more qualified than the Prussian German.
And Germany can thus entirely devote herself to her world ambitions,
whilst Austria is entirely absorbed by her racial conflict--for the
King of Prussia!
For the last twenty-five years the process of Germanizing has been
going on without interruption. A bitter war of races and languages is
being waged between the Austrian German and the Magyar, between the
Teuton and the Slav. Of the Slav the Austrian Teuton wants to make
his political slave. To him 'Slav' and 'slave' are synonymous words;
and when we consider that the Slavs are disunited in language and
religion, and that they hate each other almost as cordially as they
hate the _Niemets_; and when we further consider that behind the ten
millions of Austrian Germans there will be sixty-five millions of
other Germans to support them, whilst the Catholic Tcheches and Poles
can only fall back on the support of abhorred and heretical Russia,
there is every reason to fear that the Slav must eventually come under
the economic and political control of the Austrian Germans--that is to
say, ultimately under the influence of the German Empire.
But it is not only the Slavs of the Austrian Empire that are
threatened by German absorption; that absorption has rapidly extended
to the Slav States of the Balkan Peninsula. On the south as well as on
the north of the Danube, Austria has been used as the 'cat's-paw,' or,
to use the more dignified expression of Emperor William, as the 'loyal
_Sekundant_' of the Hohenzollern. The occupation of Bosnia-Herzegovina,
in defiance of the Treaty of Berlin, was the beginning of that
Austrian _Drang nach Osten_ policy, the next object of which is the
possession of the Gulf of Salonica, and the ultimate object of which
is the control of Constantinople."
XVI.--GERMANY CONTROLLING TURKEY.[11]
[11] This was published in 1906.
"The absorption of Turkey is not a distant dream: it is very nearly an
accomplished fact. Twenty-five years ago Germany declared she had no
political stake in the affairs of Turkey. As recently as the
'seventies, Bismarck proclaimed in the Reichstag that the Eastern
Question was not worth the loss of one Pomeranian soldier.
To-day Germany is wellnigh supreme on the Bosphorus. She started by
sending military instructors, amongst whom was the famous General Von
der Goltz Pasha, and by reorganizing the Turkish Army on the German
model. She then sent her travellers, absorbing the commerce of the
country. She then sent her engineers, obtaining concessions, building
railways, and practically obtaining the control of the so-called
'Oriental' line. Finally, she became the self-appointed doctor of the
'sick man.' Whenever the illness of recent years came to a
crisis--after the Armenian and the Macedonian atrocities, after the
Cretan insurrection--Germany stepped in and paralyzed the action of
Europe. It was Germany that not only enabled Turkey to crush Greece
and to restore her military prestige: it was Germany that enabled her
to reap the fruits of victory.
For ten years Lohengrin appeared as the temporal providence, the
protector of Abdul Hamid. The Holy Roman Emperor appeared as the
saviour of the Commander of the Faithful. A Power which did not have
one Mohammedan subject claimed to protect two hundred million
Mohammedans. And when, in 1897, Emperor William went on his memorable
pilgrimage to Jerusalem, this latter-day pilgrim entered into a solemn
compact with a Sovereign still reeking from the blood of 200,000
Christians. The Cross made an unholy alliance with the Crescent.
This alliance, coinciding with the journey to Jerusalem, marked a
further step in the forward movement, in the _Drang nach Osten_
policy. It was the third and the last stage, and by far the most
important one. It was obvious that, on the European side of the
Bosphorus, Germany could not make much further progress for some years
to come. The times were not ripe. International jealousies might be
prematurely roused, all the more so because neither the German Kaiser
nor his subjects have the discretion and modesty of success. But on
the Asiatic side there extended a vast Asiatic inheritance, to which,
as yet, there was no European claimant; to which already, forty years
ago, German patriots like Moltke, German economists like Roscher and
List, had drawn the attention of the Vaterland--a country with a
healthy climate and with infinite resources as yet undeveloped. This
was to be in the immediate future the field of German colonization. On
his way to Jerusalem the German Emperor pressed once more his devoted
friend the Sultan for an extension of German enterprise in Asia Minor.
The concession of the railway to Baghdad was granted, and a new and
marvellous horizon opened before the Hohenzollern."
XVII.--GERMAN SOCIALISM MAKING FOR REACTION AND WAR.
"And not only is German Socialism not as strong, neither is it as
pacifist as is generally supposed. Outsiders take it for granted that
in the event of a conflict between France and Germany there would be
solidarity between the French and the German artisans. They assume
that Socialism is essentially international. And in theory such an
assumption is quite legitimate. But many things in Germany are
national which elsewhere are universal. And in Germany Socialism is
becoming national, as German political economy is national, as German
science is national, as German religion is national. Therefore the
political axiom that German Socialists would necessarily come to an
understanding with their French and English brethren has been
falsified by the event. German Socialists have, no doubt, shown their
pacific intentions; they have issued pacific manifestoes and organized
pacific processions; they have filed off in their hundreds of
thousands in the streets of Berlin to protest against the war party;
but when the question of peace or war has been brought to a point in
Socialist congresses--when their foreign brethren have moved that in
the case of an unjust aggression the German Social Democrats should
declare a military strike--German Socialists have refused to assent.
The dramatic oratorical duel which took place between the French and
the German delegates at the Congress of Stuttgart illustrates the
differences between the national temperament of the Frenchman and the
German. When called upon to proclaim the military strike, the German
Socialists gave as an excuse that such a decision would frighten away
from the Social Democrat party hundreds of thousands of middle-class
supporters. This excuse is an additional proof of the moral and
political weakness of Social Democracy. It illustrates its moral
weakness; for the Socialist leaders sacrifice a great principle for
the sake of an electoral gain. The leaders know that nationalist
feeling runs high in the middle classes; they know that any
anti-militarist policy would be unpopular. And they have not the
courage as a party to face unpopularity. And the arguments used at
Stuttgart also illustrate the political weakness of German Socialism;
for they show that the Socialist vote does not possess the cohesion
and homogeneity with which it is credited: they show that hundreds of
thousands of citizens who record a Socialist vote are not Socialists
at all. To vote for Socialism is merely an indirect way of voting
against the Government. There is no organized Opposition in Germany.
The Socialists are the only party who are "agin the Government." And
all those German citizens who are dissatisfied with conditions as they
are choose this indirect and clumsy method of voting for the
Socialists in order to express their dissatisfaction with the present
Prussian despotism.
It is therefore not true to say that Socialism in Germany is a
decisive force working for peace. It would be more true to say that it
is a force working for war, simply because it is a force working for
reaction. Prussian reaction would not be so strong if it were not for
the bugbear of Social Democracy. If Social Democracy attracts a
considerable section of the lower middle class, it repels and
frightens the bulk of the middle classes as well as of the upper
classes. Many Liberals who would otherwise oppose the Government
support it from horror of the red flag, and they strengthen
unwillingly the power of reaction. And therefore it would scarcely be
a paradox to say that the nearer the approach of the Socialistic
reign, the greater would be the danger to international peace. German
contemporary history illustrates once more a general law of history,
that the dread of a civil war is often a direct cause of a foreign
war, and that the ruling classes are driven to seek outside a
diversion from internal difficulties. Thus political unrest ushered in
the wars of the Revolution and the Empire; thus the internal
difficulties of Napoleon III. brought about the Franco-German War;
thus the internal upheaval of Russia in our days produced the
Russo-Japanese War.
It may be true that power is slipping away from the hands of the
Prussian Junkerthum and the bureaucracy, although Prussian reaction is
far stronger than most foreign critics realize. But whether it be
strong or weak, one thing is certain: a power which has been supreme
for two centuries will not surrender without a struggle. The Prussian
Junkers may be politically stupid, but they have not lost the fighting
spirit, and they will not give way to the 'mob.' Before Prussian
reaction capitulates, it will play its last card and seek salvation in
a European conflagration."
XVIII.--IS THE KAISER MAKING FOR PEACE OR FOR WAR?
"Is the tremendous power and popularity of the Kaiser exercised in the
direction of peace or in the direction of war?
To an Englishman the Kaiser's devotion to military pursuits, his
frequent brandishing of the sword, his aggressive policy of naval
expansion, seem to be in flagrant contradiction with his no less
persistent protests both of his sympathy for England and of his love
for peace. We are reminded that Napoleon III. also delighted to
express his love for peace--"_L'Empire c'est la paix_"--yet he brought
about the most disastrous war in French history. We are reminded that
Nicholas II. of Russia also started his reign as the peacemaker of
Europe, the initiator of the Conference of The Hague, yet he brought
about the most bloody war in Russian history. Are the Kaiser's pacific
protests as futile, are his sympathies as hollow, as those of a
Napoleon or a Nicholas?
Unfortunately, if the Kaiser's protests of peace are supported by many
of his utterances and sanctioned by the interests of his dynasty, they
are contradicted not only by many other utterances, but, what is more
serious, they are contradicted by his personal methods, and, above
all, by the whole trend of his general policy.
Very few observers have pointed out one special reason why the
personal methods of the Kaiser will prove in the end dangerous to
peace--namely, that they have tended to paralyze or destroy the
methods of diplomacy.
Little as we may like the personnel of legations and embassies,
strongly as we disapprove of the methods by which they are recruited,
urgent as is the reform of the Foreign Office, it remains no less true
that the function of diplomacy is more vital to-day than it ever was
in the past. For it is of the very purpose and _raison d'être_ of
diplomacy to be conciliatory and pacific. Its object is to achieve by
persuasion and negotiation what otherwise must be left to the
arbitrament of war. It is a commonplace on the part of Radicals to
protest against the practices of occult diplomacy. In so far as that
protest is directed against the spirit which animates the members of
the diplomatic service, it is fully justified. But in so far as it is
directed against the principle of secret negotiation, the protest is
absurd. For it is of the very essence of diplomacy that it shall be
secret, that it shall be left to experts, that it shall be removed
from the heated atmosphere of popular assemblies, and that it shall
substitute an appeal to intellect and reason for the appeal to popular
emotion and popular prejudice.
For that reason it is deeply to be regretted that the personal
interferences of the Kaiser have taken German diplomacy out of the
hands of negotiators professionally interested in a peaceful solution
of international difficulties, and have indirectly brought diplomacy
under the influence of the German 'patriot' and the jingo. An
Ambassador need not depend on outside approval; his work is done in
quiet and solitude. The Kaiser, on the contrary, conducts his foreign
policy in the glaring limelight of publicity; and whenever he has been
criticized by experts, his vanity has only too often been tempted to
appeal to popular passion and to gain popular applause. For that
reason, and entirely apart from his indiscretions, the bare fact that
the Kaiser has become his own Foreign Secretary has lessened the
chances of peace.
Nor has the whole trend of his domestic policy been less injurious to
the cause of peace. In vain does the Kaiser assure us of his pacific
intentions: a ruler cannot with impunity glorify for ever the wars of
the past, spend most of the resources of his people on the
preparations for the wars of the future, encourage the warlike spirit,
make the duel compulsory on officers and the _Mensur_ honourable to
students, place his chief trust in his Junkers, who live and move and
have their being in the game of war, foster the aggressive spirit in
the nation, and hold out ambitions which can only be fulfilled by an
appeal to arms: a ruler cannot for ever continue to saw the dragon's
teeth and only reap harvests of yellow grain and golden grapes."
XIX.--BELGIUM THE ACHILLES HEEL OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE.
"Personally I am inclined to think that the fear of a German invasion
has haunted far too exclusively the imagination of the English people,
and has diverted their attention from another danger far more real and
far more immediate. With characteristic _naïveté_ and insular
selfishness, some jingoes imagine that if only the naval armaments of
Germany could be stopped, all danger to England would be averted. But
surely the greatest danger to England is not the invasion of England:
it is the invasion of France and Belgium. For in the case of an
invasion of England, even the Germans admit that the probabilities of
success would all be against Germany; whilst in the case of an
invasion of France, the Germans claim that the probabilities are all
in their favour. It is therefore in France and Belgium that the
vulnerable point lies, the Achilles heel of the British Empire."
XX.--THE NEUTRALITY OF BELGIUM WILL BE VIOLATED.
"It is true that in theory the neutrality of Belgium is guaranteed by
international treaties; but when I observe the signs of the times, the
ambitions of the German rulers, and when I consider such indications
as the recent extension of strategic railways on the Belgian-German
frontiers, I do not look forward with any feeling of security to
future contingencies in the event of a European war. I am not at all
convinced that the scare of a German invasion of England is justified.
Indeed, I am inclined to believe the Germans when they assert that in
case of war Germany would not be likely to invade Britain. She would
be far more likely to invade Belgium, because Belgium has always been
the pawn in the great game of European politics, and has often been,
and may again become, the battlefield and cockpit of Europe."
XXI.--THE COMING WAR WILL BE A POLITICAL AND RELIGIOUS CRUSADE.
"If a war between the two countries did break out, it would not be
merely an economic war, like the colonial wars between France and
England in the eighteenth century; rather would it partake of the
nature of a political and religious crusade, like the French wars of
the Revolution and the Empire. _The present conflict between England
and Germany is the old conflict between Liberalism and despotism,
between industrialism and militarism, between progress and reaction,
between the masses and the classes._ The conflict between England and
Germany is a conflict, on the one hand, between a nation which
believes in political liberty and national autonomy, where the Press
is free and where the rulers are responsible to public opinion, and,
on the other hand, a nation where public opinion is still muzzled or
powerless and where the masses are still under the heel of an absolute
government, a reactionary party, a military Junkerthum, and a despotic
bureaucracy.
The root of the evil lies in the fact that in Germany the war spirit
and the war caste still prevail, and that a military Power like
Prussia is the predominant partner in the German Confederation. The
mischievous masterpiece of Carlyle on Frederick the Great, and his
more mischievous letter to _The Times_, have misled English opinion as
to the true character and traditions and aims of the Prussian
monarchy. Prussia has been pre-eminently for two hundred years the
military and reactionary State of Central Europe, much more so even
than Russia. Prussia owes whatever she is, and whatever territory she
has, to a systematic policy of cunning and deceit, of violence and
conquest. No doubt she has achieved an admirable work of organization
at home, and has fulfilled what was perhaps a necessary historic
mission, but in her international relations she has been mainly a
predatory Power. She has stolen her Eastern provinces from Poland. She
is largely responsible for the murder of a great civilized nation.
She has wrested Silesia from Austria. She has taken Hanover from its
legitimate rulers. She has taken Schleswig-Holstein from Denmark,
Alsace-Lorraine from France. And to-day the military caste in Prussia
trust and hope that a final conflict with England will consummate what
previous wars have so successfully accomplished in the past. They are
all the more anxious to enter the lists and to run the hazards of war
because it becomes more and more difficult to govern a divided
Reichstag and a dissatisfied people without uniting them against a
foreign enemy, and because they realize that unless they restore their
prestige and consolidate their power by a signal victory the days of
their predominance are numbered."
XXII.--THE NATURE OF THE COMING WAR.
"The war of to-morrow, therefore, will not be like the war of 1870, a
war confined to two belligerent forces: it will be a universal
European war. Nor will it be a humane war, subject to the rules of
international law and to the decrees of the Hague Tribunal: it will be
an inexorable war; or, to use the expression of von Bernhardi, it will
be 'a war to the knife.' Nor will it be decided in a few weeks, like
the war of 1870: it will involve a long and difficult campaign, or
rather a succession of campaigns; it will mean to either side
political annihilation or supremacy."